


bury my body (down by the highway side)

by baudelaires



Series: dancin' with the devil [1]
Category: Buzzfeed Unsolved (Web Series)
Genre: Deals With The Devil, F/M, Ghost Hunting, M/M, Slow Burn, demon shane, demonic rituals, gratuitous use of Robert Johnson song lyrics as chapter titles, probably a lot of swearing since both ryan and i love to swear
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-18
Updated: 2018-05-13
Packaged: 2019-04-17 10:04:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14186508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/baudelaires/pseuds/baudelaires
Summary: “Because ghosts aren’t real, Ryan,” he can’t resist adding with a wicked grin.Or, alternatively:Shane is a demon.Ryan knows. Part of him has known since San Jose, since Mexico, since Kansas.After all, Shane hasn't exactly been very subtle.





	1. the sallie house

 

You want to make a deal, and so you come here, to the crossroads, where two roads are not the only things crossing over each other. Here, where the fabric between them is weakened, two worlds overlap as well; the mortal world and the world of spirits.

 

You come to the crossroads because you want something. It might be money, it might be love, or power, or health, or maybe even to live forever. Whatever it is, you are starving for it. You are desperate.  

 

And desperate people will do anything to get what they want.

 

That’s why the Devil’s business does so well.

 

But before you make the deal, before you sign away your life to a stranger with unnerving yellow eyes and a smile that’s stretched a little too wide for comfort, a word of warning. Take it from someone who stood where you once did, who thought the price of the bargain was well worth the results. The deal is never worth the price. Close the gate, walk away, and never come back.

* * *

 

**SHANE**

_SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA_

_PRESENT DAY_

 

Standing outside the church with Ryan beside him, Shane is nervous, and not only because it’s their first on-location shoot together.

 

Behind the camera, TJ gives them a nod. They’re rolling. Shane takes a steadying breath in as Ryan begins to speak.

 

“This week on Buzzfeed Unsolved, we’re gonna visit some of the most haunted places in the world in an effort to answer some questions that I’ve always been curious about.”

 

Shane is beginning to zone out.

 

“Are ghosts and demons real?”

 

Abruptly, he zones back in, the words grabbing his attention. He tries to school his features back into a neutral expression, hoping he didn’t look too startled.

 

“And if they are real,” Ryan continues. “Can they manipulate, harm, and perhaps even kill the living?”

 

Shane’s mouth twitches into a smile, one that he can’t keep off his face, no matter how hard he tries. Ryan doesn’t seem to notice, intent on the camera and on his script. “Right now, we’re at Sacred Heart Church to meet Father Gary Thomas, and let me tell you, this guy is the real deal.” Shane’s smile falters.

 

“You’re gonna be thankful we’re meeting this guy,” Ryan says, glancing up at him for a hot second. Shane shakes his head minutely. He mumbles something along the lines of, “No, I don’t think I will be,” as panic starts to pool in his gut.

 

As soon as they step inside the church, Shane starts to feel sick, overcome with the feeling that he’s not welcome here, he doesn’t belong. The statues and stained-glass paintings of various saints seem to glare at him as he walks past. His eyes itch painfully, and he peeks at his reflection in a mirror as they stroll by. His eyes flicker red for a minute, then back to what he’s come to think of as their regular, human brown. He lets out a frustrated hiss, blinking furiously.

 

“You must be Shane and Ryan,” says a voice. A middle-aged man dressed in the black shirt and white collar of a priest steps forward to greet them. He holds out his hand to shake. Shane wipes his sweating palm on his pants before he does. “I’m Gary Thomas.” They talk for a bit, Shane thinks, though he’s not really listening, too busy trying not to vomit. His whole body feels hot, like he’s burning, and he is not eager to repeat that experience. He’s had enough of that for an eternity, thanks.

 

They sit down in the pews to do their little interview with the Father. Shane only catches a few key words. “Preternatural, parasitic, feeds off our life form.” He manages to get out a couple jokes and questions, just so it seems like he is paying attention, but mostly leaves the talking to Ryan. The whole time, he avoids looking at the cameras, feeling his eyes itching again. He can’t maintain this illusion much longer, not here, on holy ground.

 

He beelines for the car as soon as they’re out of there, pausing to check his reflection in the side mirror of their rental car. He breathes an involuntary sigh of relief. His eyes are brown.

 

“You okay, dude?” Ryan asks, catching up to him. “You ran out of there pretty quick.” He shoots Shane a quizzical glance.

 

“Yeah, it was just stuffy in there,” Shane says. It’s a feeble excuse, but Ryan seems to buy it, so he leaves it at that. “I was never a church guy.”

 

“Me neither, but maybe I should be. I feel so much better after talking to that guy, oh man,” Ryan’s grinning, and Shane can tell it’s that unconscious kind of grin that sneaks onto his face without him realizing it, wide and unplanned and just genuinely happy.

 

Shane finds himself smiling back. “You ready to hit the road, buckaroo?”

 

“You know, I wasn’t this morning, but now? Let’s do this.” Ryan gets into the driver’s seat, Shane slides into the passenger side. The bottle of holy water is placed in the cupholder in the centre console, and Shane is careful not to let his bare hands brush up against it as they drive.

 

Ryan hums along to the radio, and Shane feels the vibration in his bones, the electric energy coursing through him like a wave. All the while, the sun begins slowly to set, casting long shadows across the pavement, and the things that live in these dark, shadowed places begin to come out.

* * *

 

**RYAN**

_ATCHISON, KANSAS_

_PRESENT DAY_

 

By the time they get to Atchison, Ryan is completely sick of planes. He doesn’t even want to think of the four and a half hour flight from Kansas to L.A. awaiting them tomorrow.

 

“Just think, if you get eaten by a demon tonight, you won’t have to ever get on another plane again!” Shane jokes from the passenger seat of their rental car. As usual, he’s refused to drive. Ryan is tired, but he doesn’t mind. Concentrating on the road ahead keeps him from getting too in his head about what’s waiting for him at the end of this little road trip through the flat Kansas landscape. Wheat field after wheat field fly by outside the windows, interrupted every so often by a farmhouse or a cow pasture.

 

Ryan’s head snaps to Shane. “Don’t even joke about that,” he warns. Shane has a shit eating grin on his face, and despite his nerves about tonight’s shoot, Ryan can’t help but smile back.

 

He turns back to the road, back to the neverending parade of farm fields. Shane pulls one of the GoPros out of the equipment bags piled in the backseat to get a few shots of the scenery. After a few minutes he turns the camera on Ryan.

 

Ryan glances over, looks into the camera with a bemused smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. “What are you doing?” he asks.

 

Shane holds his water bottle out like its a microphone. “Mr. Bergara, do you have anything to say about tonight’s shoot?” He’s using one of his silly, cartoon-character voices, and the look on his face is so deadpan and serious that Ryan can’t help but giggle. “You’re a dumbass.” he says, rolling his eyes.

 

“That’s not an answer!” Shane exclaims, exasperated.

 

“I’m not telling you where we’re going. It’s a surprise.” Ryan maintains. “Besides, I thought you didn’t care. I thought you were just along for the ride.”

 

“I don’t,” Shane replies, turning away to look out the window. He has a weird look on his face, one that Ryan can’t quite read.

 

They’re in Atchison now, houses and stores crowding up against the road on all sides, replacing the open, empty countryside they’ve been seeing for the past almost hour during their drive from the airport with a cluster of brick walls and dusty windows.

 

Out of the corner of his eye, Ryan sees Shane twist in his seat, shifting positions. Ryan almost feels bad for him; he can’t be comfortable on these long car rides, long legs all scrunched up. Then they turn onto 2nd Street and he can’t think anything other than, _oh fuck_.

 

They’re here.

 

“It’s so much worse than I imagined,” Ryan says. Shane gives him a questioning look, brows furrowed. “It’s just a house, Ryan.”

 

Ryan shakes his head. He feels paralyzed, unwilling to get out of the car. He stares at the house through the windshield. The house stares right back, the windows black and empty like gaping mouths, ready to swallow him whole. A cool night wind hits him in the face and he startles, whirling to see that Shane has the passenger side door open and is already out of the car, stretching slowly. Just behind him, TJ and the rest of the crew have pulled up and are unloading the equipment.

 

“C’mon, Ryan,” Shane urges. “We didn’t drive all the way out here for nothing.” When that doesn’t work, he wags his eyebrows. “Hurry up, don’t keep your demon waiting.”

 

That gets Ryan moving, if only because he wants to strangle Shane and he can’t do that if he’s sitting in the car.

* * *

 

**SHANE**

_Atchison, Kansas_

_Present Day_

 

It takes them a few minutes to get organized, TJ and the crew unpacking all the cameras and booms and other gear, him and Ryan strapping on their GoPros and setting up the handhelds. Ryan takes an extra long time to get all his batteries changed and all the audio recorders set up. Shane watches him fuss over the equipment with a smile twitching at the corners of his lips. He’s stalling.

 

“Hurry up, dude, we’re running out of daylight here, and Teege wants to get some good shots of us on the porch!” he calls. Ryan might be nervous, but he’s raring to go, and it’s not only because of the abundance of energy buzzing through him, from all the electronic equipment he’s surrounded by. Or maybe it is. He can’t be sure.

 

Finally, Ryan locks up the car and starts up the laneway towards them. Then recognition flashes across his face, and he pauses to grab his bottle of holy water from the backseat of the car.

 

“Can’t forget this!” he says. Shane laughs. “Don’t ask me for some later!” Ryan tells him defensively.

 

“Oh, I won’t,” Shane replies, taking a few involuntary steps backward as Ryan approaches, holy water in hand.

 

“Everyone thinks feeling energy is bullshit, but you don’t feel strange at all? Not even a little bit?” Ryan asks, as they climb the porch steps together. Shane moves toward the door, peeking through the windows. It’s dark inside the house, so he can’t really see anything. But yeah, he does _feel_ something, a presence, faint so far. It surprises him, because the other two places they’ve been so far had nothing in the way of spiritual residents. The Winchester House and the Doll Island, while interesting and certainly very creepy, were boring and devoid of ghosts and ghouls. This though, could be something.

 

Aware that Ryan is watching him expectantly, he shakes his head and lies, “No, not really.”

 

He opens the door and they step inside. He’s hit with a wave of cold, but it’s more the fact that the heat in the house hasn’t been turned on in god knows how long than a spiritual kind of cold. As they move deeper into the house, into the living room, Ryan is very clearly on edge. Shane wonders how much of the malevolent presence he can actually feel. It’s still faint and far-off, but it’s there, hovering right on the boundaries of Shane’s awareness. It’s quickly getting annoying, like an itch he can’t quite reach.

 

“I’ve lived my life with one adage and that’s don’t fuck with demons,” Ryan says, as they get settled on the dusty, outdated living room furniture.

 

 _Whoops,_ Shane thinks, smirking over at Ryan. _It’s a little too late for that, buddy._

 

Ryan is very clearly on edge, and Shane wonders how much of the malevolent presence he can actually feel. It’s still faint and far-off, but it’s there, hovering right on the boundaries of Shane’s awareness, like an itch he can’t quite reach.

 

They get some cameras set up in a little circle around the couch, and once they get rolling, Ryan launches into his little prepared story about the history of the house and its inhabitants. While he talks, Shane feels that slight pressure on the very fringes of his awareness increase just a little. His ears buzz with static, and he shakes his head to clear it. Was he imagining it or did he just hear the sound of claws scratching against plaster from upstairs?

 

Ryan’s talking about the demon now, how it presents itself as a little girl, how it posed as the imaginary friend of one of the children who used to live in the house. _Fuckin’ perv_ , Shane thinks.

  
The whole time Ryan is talking, Shane can feel that presence from before creeping nearer and nearer. It draws back slightly upon the arrival of Eric, the paranormal investigator. It’s wary of a new person in the house, especially when he arrived just as it was getting used to Shane and Ryan and the camera crew being there. Shane gets the impression that it’s shy, skittish. Probably a small-time demon, its powers limited to the confines of this house.

  
“I can’t believe you hired a paranormal investigator, Ry,” Shane mutters once he’s sure Eric is out of earshot.

  
“What? I thought he’d provide some...some insight,” Ryan replies indignantly. “Plus, I’m hardly an expert out in the field. So far I’ve really only done desk research, I never thought I’d find myself in a demon house!” He’s agitated, and his fear is feeding whatever’s lurking here, in the dark corners of the house. It’s so strong it’s giving Shane an extra energy boost, and he’s not even trying to leech off of Ryan’s energy.

  
“Hey, man,” Shane murmurs to him, trying to get him to calm down. “You’re gonna be fine. You can do this.” Ryan looks up at him through long, dark lashes and gives him a nervous smile.

 

In the kitchen. Eric has his flashlight set up on the counter. He steps back, calling out, “Could you please turn the light on for us?” Beside Shane, Ryan just keeps repeating, “Don’t do it, don’t do it, don’t do it…” over and over again, like it’s his new mantra.

  
Shane lets out a laugh, raises his voice to call out, “Demon?” Ryan is shaking beside him. “Don’t call it that, stop talking to it!”

  
“No, I just wanna talk to the demons...hey, I think you guys are swell!” he calls, trying to hold back more laughter. Ryan is staring at him, his eyes so wide that Shane worries his eyeballs are gonna just pop right out of his head.

  
“If you like the guys staying here, turn the light on,” Eric says, interrupting their banter.

  
Shane moves closer to the flashlight, crouches beside it. “If you don’t like us, turn it on,” he says, his voice low. He can hear that static buzzing again, and there’s a scratching coming from behind the kitchen wall.  
The light turns on, and Ryan screams. Shane just laughs. Turning lights on and slamming cupboard doors is really the best this thing can do? They’re party tricks.

 

Across the kitchen, Ryan seems to be having an honest-to-God panic attack, screaming and shaking, his breath coming in ragged gasps. Shane moves towards him, lays a hand on his shoulder and squeezes gently. “You’re okay, Ry. It’s okay.” He uses the nickname for the second time that night, and it feels strange in his mouth, like it’s too private, too intimate to be uttered here.

 

Eric invites the demon to turn the light back on. Shane can feel it drawing nearer, enticed by Eric’s gentle prompts.

 

“I don’t think they have the power to turn it on again, frankly,” he mocks loudly.

 

His attempt to make it feel unwelcome fails. On the counter, the light turns on, blazing defiantly to life. Shane arches an eyebrow at it.

 

“Turn it off, please, spirit,” Eric requests politely. Slowly, the light turns off, like the entity is struggling. A smile twists Shane’s lips. She’s obviously not very strong, as he suspected.

 

Ryan, crouched beside the light, looks like he’s about to start crying. He slides down the cupboards until he’s sitting on the floor, head cradled in his hands.

  
“Hey, buddy, it’s okay, calm down. It’s just a light, it can’t hurt you.” Shane moves to crouch beside a shaking Ryan, puts a hand on his knee. “It can’t hurt you, Ryan, okay?” Ryan meets his eyes, gaze watery with tears, and nods. He lets Shane pull him to his feet, and Shane holds him there for a second, flush against his chest. “Nothing’s gonna hurt as long as I’m here.”

 

As they explore the rest of the house, the static in Shane’s ears grows steadily louder. It’s at its worst in the basement. It’s there, in the dark, damp basement, when Eric brings out the flashlight again, that little Sallie finally materializes. She startles Shane when she appears, creeping out of the shadowy corner beside the hole.

 

She’s tiny, a porcelain-faced little girl with blonde hair tied in pink ribbons, wearing a pink nightgown. At first glance, she looks sweet and unassuming. Then Shane looks closer, and sees upon closer inspection that her fingers are actually long, curved claws. When she smiles, her teeth are sharp fangs, crowded together in her mouth like the teeth of a shark.  
  
When the light doesn’t turn on, even when Shane starts talking at it, even when he’s laying on the floor in the pentagram-stain, he looks right at Sallie and says, “I think this demon’s a wimp!” It’s a challenge.

  
The light flicks on.

  
Ryan starts screaming again, and Sallie flits a little closer to him. Shane steps into her path, stopping her from getting any nearer.

  
“Turn the light off, please, for Ryan’s sake,” Eric is saying. Sallie glares at Shane.

  
“Turn it off, demon!” he says, keeping his voice light. She shakes her head at him and snarls, baring her mouthful of shark teeth.

  
Shane rolls his eyes and with one look at the flashlight, he effortlessly turns it off, stopping the flow of electricity like he’s damming a river.

  
Sallie flinches, draws back into the corner, as far away from him as she can get. Satisfied, Shane turns back to Ryan, who has stopped screaming, but is shaking like a leaf in the wind.

  
“Okay, buddy, I think it’s time to head back upstairs,” Shane suggests gently. Ryan doesn’t argue.

  
Eric leaves, and the two of them set up their sleeping gear. Ryan, still visibly freaked out, moves his sleeping bag closer to Shane’s.

 

“I’m moving closer to you, I don’t care,” Ryan says. “Okay,” Shane chokes out, suddenly overwhelmed by Ryan’s nearness, and how he can smell Ryan’s shampoo, which he realizes smells a little like peppermint.

  
“God, you’re like a furnace,” Ryan mumbles. They're close enough that, through their sleeping bags, their sides have brushed up against each other. “Why are you so warm?”

 

“It’s the hellfire in my soul,” Shane replies lightly. Ryan huffs out a little laugh, and Shane smiles to himself, lying back against the cold, hard floor. While he's pretty sure Sallie is going to leave them alone for the rest of the night, he can still hear distant static, and though he doesn’t need sleep, it’s going to get very annoying very fast.

 

Same goes for Ryan nudging him every few minutes because he thinks he heard a noise. 

 

He’s almost glad when, at 3AM, they leave the house forever.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much for reading, guys! 
> 
> Feel free to leave comments, whether they're about what you like about this fic or what you don't like. Like most writers, I'm fueled by (constructive) criticism as much as I am by compliments. And also please feel free to come chat with me on tumblr! You can find me @lant-sov.tumblr.com
> 
> Also, a few quick disclaimers!   
> 1\. Some of the dialogue I wrote myself, some of the dialogue is directly from the videos.  
> 2\. Please bear in mind that I, as someone who doesn't live in America, know nothing about any of the streets, cities, or towns that the Boys may visit while on-location in this fic, as is possibly evident in my descriptions of Atchison.   
> 3\. I know next to nothing about their filming and editing process, so I'm pretty much just making that up as I go along.
> 
> In any case, I hope this is as fun for you guys to read as it is for me to write! (and please remember that this is all in fun and I don't want to force anything even remotely shippy onto the Boys irl)   
> (I do firmly believe that Shane might actually be a demon though.)


	2. rising sun going down

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What's that? No one wanted to read some of Shane's heavily introspective backstory? Too bad, you get to read it anyway...
> 
> Sorry in advance for any typos.

**RYAN** _  
_ _ATCHISON, KANSAS_

_PRESENT DAY_

 

When Ryan wakes, he’s somehow more exhausted than he was when he went to sleep. Granted, he didn’t really sleep all that much. They’d checked into the motel at almost four in the morning, and now it’s...he reaches for his phone, turning it on to check the time. Eight thirty. So, four and a half hours of sleep.

 

He groans.

 

“Oh, you’re up,” says a bleary voice somewhere to Ryan’s right. He sits up, looks over to find Shane, lying in his bed, scrolling through his phone. He’s already dressed, Ryan notes, though he didn’t bother to comb his sleep-mussed hair and his eyes are puffy with fatigue beneath his glasses.

 

“Yeah, I’m up,” Ryan mumbles, swinging his legs out of bed.

 

“What time is the flight again?” Shane asks.

 

“It’s at two,” Ryan replies. “We’ll be in L.A. by six o’clock tonight.”

 

Shane considers this for a moment. “Sweet. Wanna go grab some breakfast?”

 

What Ryan wants is to climb back under the covers and sleep for the next week, but he’s also hungry. Eventually, his hunger wins out, and he gets dressed hurriedly, not caring that his hair is a rumpled mess or that the shirt he fished out of his suitcase is wrinkled. All he cares about is getting a plate of shitty eggs and bacon from the motel’s continental breakfast bar.

 

“It’s closed,” Shane remarks, staring at the door of the motel restaurant.

 

“What do you mean, it’s closed?” Ryan demands.

 

“I mean, it’s not open. Apparently they’re not open Sundays. Or Mondays. Or Thursdays, for some reason.” Shane points to the sign on the door. “I wonder if this demon town has a Denny’s?”

 

Ryan is tired of driving. But again, his hunger wins out, and they get into their rental car. Shane, in the passenger seat as always, pulls up the GPS on his phone to see if Atchison has a Denny’s.

 

It does not.

 

“No Denny’s. Small towns really are awful,” Shane sighs. “There’s a McDonald’s though. And a 24-hour taco joint.”

 

They end up at the McDonald’s. Sitting in a cracked and greasy booth in the greyish light of morning, an Egg McMuffin warm and cheesy in his hands, the fear Ryan felt last night at the Sallie House feels distant and illogical. He looks across the table at Shane, who is sipping tentatively at his coffee and staring out the window into the mostly vacant parking lot. He has a pensive look on his face, like he’s deep in his thoughts. Ryan is struck by a sudden urge to know what he’s thinking about.

 

“What’s on your mind, big guy?” he asks, throwing his balled up McMuffin wrapper at his friend.

 

Shane swats the wrapper away, eyes flicking to Ryan. Light glares off his glasses as he turns his head, and it makes his eyes look funny, like they’ve changed colour. “Oh, you know. Just thinking.”

 

“About?” Ryan prompts.

 

“How ghosts aren’t real,” Shane says with a smirk.

 

Ryan scoffs, wishing he had another wrapper to throw at him. “Asshole. Even after everything we’ve been through the past couple days? The Winchester, Mexico, last night?”

 

Shane nods. “Yep.” He pops the _p_.

 

Ryan laughs, shaking his head. “Asshole,” he repeats.

 

Shane grins and dunks his hashbrown into his little paper cup of ketchup. “You know it, baby.”

 

“Don’t call me baby,” Ryan says, scowling.

* * *

  **SHANE**

_LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA_

_PRESENT DAY_

 

Shane feels rejuvenated the moment they touch down at LAX. The lights, the music, the neon signs of downtown Los Angeles are to a demon what a car battery is to a lightbulb. The sheer amount of electric energy surrounding him right now is enough to supercharge him for the rest of eternity.

 

“Why are you so cheery?” Ryan asks, noticing Shane bouncing on the balls of his feet and grinning ear to ear as they stand in the baggage claim. The shorter man has dark, tired bags under his eyes, and his hair is sticking up wildly after his sleepless night and the long plane ride from Kansas.

 

“Just happy to be home,” Shane replies innocently.

 

It’s strange, he thinks, how he’s come to think of Los Angeles as home. Then again, the only home he’s had since Chicago nearly 200 years ago is Hell, and Lucifer isn’t exactly into making _Home Sweet Home_ and _Bless This Mess_ needlepoints to hang on the office walls.

 

He wonders how things are going down there, anyway. It’s been a while since he visited. Not that he misses the barren plains or the hot, smoky air that scorches your lungs with every breath in. He much prefers being here, in the back of an Uber with the windows down so that he can taste the salt in the wind blowing off the ocean. It almost makes everything horrible thing he’s done in the past century worth it. Almost.

 

He’s done some pretty horrible things.

 

For example, the first deal he’d ever made.

 

_NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK_

_1885_

 

One minute he’d been standing in Lucifer’s office, gazing out the wide windows at the barren fields of Hell, cut through by bright rivers of fire. He remembered thinking the sight was almost beautiful, in a cruel and perverse kind of way. And the next minute, he was standing in New York Harbour, the night sky above him glittering with stars.

 

His breath caught for a moment, and he couldn’t be sure if the shock of being summoned for the first time had simply knocked the wind out of him, or if the sight of the stars after so long down Below had stunned him into silence. Cold night air filled his lungs, and Shane had spent so long breathing in hot smoke and ash that he nearly gasped in wonder at how fresh and clean it tasted.

 

“I want to make a deal.” A shaking voice drew his attention back to the man in front of him; a thin, shivering Irishman with tufty red hair poking out from under his cap.

 

“Let me guess. You want beauty. Money. Love.” Shane eyed the man’s lined face, tattered clothes, and muddy shoes.

 

The man’s forehead creased, bushy red brows knitting together. “No. Nothing like that. I just want a good life for my family. I want us to have protection and prosperity in America.”

 

Shane’s eyes strayed to the newly erected Statue of Liberty, standing tall over New York Harbour, torch held triumphantly in one hand. A symbol of hope and a new beginning for immigrant families like this man’s. Like Shane’s parents would have been, making the crossing from Poland to the States with nothing but the clothes on their backs and each other.

 

Only Shane’s parents had worked to give him and his siblings the life they’d had, to keep a roof over their head and food on the table. This man did not want to work to give his family that. He wanted to sign a contract and have someone else do the hard work.

 

Shane’s lips curled in a snarl. “Sign here,” he growled.

 

The Irishman did so eagerly, without reading the fine print, and three years later Shane arrived on his doorstep to collect him, and smiled while he screamed, while he was burned as Shane had once been.

 

He did this without issue, without guilt or remorse, even enjoyed it in a twisted and monstrous way. For decades, he collected souls, all of them greedy, selfish people who made deals with him for money, youth, love. He saw himself in them, in their laziness, their unwillingness to put in the necessary work to achieve the things they wanted, and he hated them for it. He hated himself for being like them, back when he was mortal, because yes, he had been mortal once. A sinner, damned even before he died.

 

He remembered that too.

 

_CHICAGO, ILLINOIS_

_1871_

 

Chicago in the late 1800s had been the filthiest city in America, and Seán Aleksander Madej, as he’d been called then, had been no exception.

 

Born in 1843 to poor immigrant parents, he spent the first ten years after he turned 18 bouncing between boarding houses, odd jobs, and opium dens. His lifetime of sin had pretty much assured him a place among the ranks of Hell. During his short time on Earth, he had been about as bad of a person as you can be, at least in the eyes of his family’s minister.

 

Then, in 1871, the city burned. Seán Madej burned too. He burned until every last shred of his humanity had been reduced to smoke and ashes, and when the Devil came to him and offered him a deal, he had unquestioningly accepted.

 

And if that made him a coward, if choosing an afterlife of service over an afterlife of eternal suffering made Shane weak, well, then so it did. After you have spent close to two decades slowly burning alive over and over again, and you are offered a deal that ensures you will never have to feel such agony again, then you are free to judge him for his choices.

 

Of course, Shane had never regretted his decision, at least not until he met Sara.

 

_LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA_

_2009_

 

By 2009, Shane had more or less gotten used to the feeling of being summoned. It was, he imagined, what it felt like to be sucked up by a vacuum cleaner, then spit out again when the vacuum cleaner was being emptied.

 

When his vision cleared, he was standing in what looked like a college dorm.

 

Not another one, he thought. Lately there had been an obscene amount of students summoning him to get their tuition paid by the Bank of Satan.

 

But when he looked around, he saw no tired-eyed students begging him to make their students loans magically disappear. Just a girl with curly hair standing by the sink in the communal kitchen, making a sandwich.

 

She turned, bottle of mustard in hand, making to put it back in the fridge. When she caught sight of him, she yelped, tossing the mustard bottle in the air. She scrambled to catch it, staring at him with wide eyes.

 

“Who are you?” she demanded, after she’d regained her composure.

 

“Who are you?” Shane demanded right back, raising his eyebrows at her.

 

“I live here!” she replied indignantly. “What’s with the contacts, dude?” She gestured to his eyes. Shane blinked, confused, then realized she was referring to his eyes, which were glowing demon red.

 

“They’re not contacts,” he explained. This girl obviously hadn’t summoned him. So who had?

 

The girl had one hand on the handle of the fridge door and one hand on her hip. “Okay, seriously, who are you?”

 

On the counter behind her sat her sandwich, still half-assembled. Realization dawned and Shane put his head in his hands. He’d seriously just been summoned by accident because this idiot college kid had accidentally drawn his summoning sigil in mustard.

 

“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” he muttered, pinching the bridge of his nose.

 

The girl frowned at him. “What?”

 

He waved a hand in the vague direction of her sandwich. “You...your...never mind.”

 

“What, are you hungry? I can make you one too,” she offered.

 

Shane goggled at her. Who was this girl? He’d grown used to people cowering in fear when they summoned him, and she was casually offering to make him lunch?

 

Whoever she was, she was quickly growing frustrated. “Do you want a sandwich or not?”

 

Shane sighed. “Yeah, sure. No, don’t worry, I can make it.”

 

While he ate, he learned her name was Sara. She was in film school, and wanted to get a job as a producer one day.

 

“So, what’s your deal, dude? You’re, like, a demon or something?” she asked. She had mustard on her chin.

 

“What gave it away?” Shane asked, trying to mask his shock.

 

“The eyes? The way you appeared out of nowhere? Also my roommate is into occult shit and I’m pretty sure I subconsciously drew a sigil from one of her weird demon books in my mustard, “ she explained with a shrug.

 

The whole thing was so ridiculous that Shane couldn’t help but laugh. He held out his hand. “I’m Shane.”

 

“If I shake, are you gonna steal my soul?” Sara asked, brows furrowed suspiciously. Shane shook his head. “No, nothing like that. You do have to make me another sandwich, though.”

 

She shook his hand. “You can make your own damn sandwich, Shane,”

 

He laughed again.

 

 _LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA_ _  
_ _PRESENT DAY_

 

Just a day after Shane and Ryan get back from Kansas, they’re back at the office. Shane beats Ryan in, as usual, and is already looking through the footage from Mexico when Ryan at last shuffles in, still looking drained and exhausted, bundled in a baggy sweatshirt that’s so faded, Shane can’t even make out what the logo on the front used to be.

 

“Hey, little man,” he says in greeting. Ryan just grunts in response. “Okay, well, good morning to you too. I started looking through the film from Mexico, thought you might have an easier time editing if I helped out.”

 

Ryan manages a tired smile. “Thanks, big guy. If you find anything interesting, send it to me, yeah?”

 

“Yeah,” Shane nods, putting his headphones back on. Something tells him he won’t find anything particularly interesting, at least nothing of interest to Ryan.

 

Sara rescues him from the endless piles of footage to be combed through at lunch, bouncing up to his desk. Her short, curly hair is dyed purple, he notices. That’s different.

 

“When did you do that?” he asks.

 

She smirks. “When you guys were gone on shoot. Did you find any ghosts, Ryan?” Her question is genuine, missing any of the sarcastic venom Shane’s voice usually carries whenever he asks Ryan that question. Unlike Shane, Sara doesn’t appreciate the irony of blatantly lying to Ryan, preferring instead to encourage his investigations.

 

Ryan shakes his head. “Sadly, no, but there are some promising EVPs from the Winchester House. Wanna give it a listen after lunch, Shane?”

 

“Yeah, sure. Can’t wait to listen to your promising recordings of the wind,” Shane snarks, giving Ryan a teasing nudge.

 

Ryan flips him the bird as he walks away with Sara, shrugging on his jacket as he goes. “Fuck you too, Bergara!” Shane calls across the office, grinning.

 

Shane and Sara getting lunch at least once a week has become something of a tradition ever since the sandwich incident, and they walk together in amicable silence to the sushi place down the street from the office.

 

“So, did you guys find any ghosts?” she asks again, knowing he’ll be honest now that they’re away from Ryan and the prying ears of their coworkers. Shane sticks his hands in his pockets and looks away, thinking back to the dark basement of the Sallie house. “Just one. She wasn’t a ghost.”

 

Sara nods knowingly. “An old work buddy of yours?” Shane snorts. “Hardly. She would barely have qualified for a job in demon HR.” That makes Sara laugh. “So you had fun, then?”

 

“If this is going to turn into you berating me for lying to Ryan, then don’t even bother.” Shane mutters. Sara starts to respond, but he cuts her off. He knows what she’s going to say. “I’m trying to keep him safe,” he insists, like he always does.

 

“And this is the best way? Lying to him and laughing at his expense?”

 

Shane sighs. “Can we please not fight about this again? You know why it has to be this way.”

 

Under her breath, Sara mutters, “I still don’t like it.”

  
_Yeah, well, you don’t have to like it_ , Shane thinks but doesn’t say, not wanting to piss her off even more. He and Sara have been fighting more and more lately, and it’s putting a real damper on their friendship. Granted, it isn’t hard to get into a fight with a demon. It’s pretty much his job to bring out the worst in people.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again for sticking it out to the end, lads. Feel free to comment and let me know what you think, or to swing by my tumblr--you can find me @lant-sov.tumblr.com
> 
> In terms of a consistent update schedule, I'm working toward trying to get chapters up every second Sunday from now on, so bear with me!


End file.
